


Pour

by edourado



Series: Hell's Kitchen Chronicles [95]
Category: Daredevil (TV), The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: F/M, Oneshot, Smut, Smutty, kastle - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-29
Updated: 2017-11-29
Packaged: 2019-02-08 13:40:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12865695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edourado/pseuds/edourado
Summary: She pulled his boots off him before they finished the first glass. They now sat under the couch, forgotten.





	Pour

Karen hesitated in front of the fridge, thinking about the article that still needed her attention.

Clicking her tongue, she decided she was due for a little thing to ease her mind. The article could still be written if she had a glass of wine of two.

She got the bottle, closed the fridge and moved to the counter to get the corkscrew and a glass.

It’s Friday, after all.

.:.

“If you check that feed one more time I’m gonna kick your ass”, said Curtis from the kitchen.

Frank looked up from the computer and towards his friend. 

“What are you even looking for, man?”

He was looking for a sign. Something that told him that he should act on that impulse, he should not let that thing die down, that he should pursue it. He was looking for an in.

“Whose window is this?” asked his friend, giving him a mug of coffee, sitting on the other chair on his small dinner table. “Is it Karen’s?”

Frank nodded, looking at the live feed of her window, baren of a flower pot.

He explained to Curtis their communication system, and his friend frowned at him, and then rolled his eyes, sipping his own coffee.

“First of all, those flowers must have died a long time ago. Second of all, who is this woman?”

Frank wasn’t sure he could explain Karen Page to him. Or what she meant. Or what was going on between them. Still, he tried.

“Sounds to me like you’re pussying out of a mission, man. In all my years, I’ve never known you to do that”, he teased and Frank sighed, running a hand on his chin, stubbly with the beard he neglected to shave for two days. “Seriously, though. All I can offer in lieu of advice is that… I think it’s been long enough. Your gut doesn’t lie to you, so if it feels like you should do it, do it. I know it’s complicated, but… You still got half your life to live.”

.:.

He missed her. Like crazy. And, unless he was grossly misreading the situation, he knew she must miss him, too.

He wasn’t misreading anything. Frank doesn’t misread things.

Only it became one of those things. the longer you waited, the harder it became to act. Had he waited long enough? Had he waited too much? Was she expecting him that same night? Did she want some kind of distance, after everything that had happened?

 _No distance,_  called his gut while he looked out on that water, standing on that same spot where he had placed a kiss on her cheek that time, following a sudden urge to show her just how much-

Walking into his apartment - not  _home_  - he opened the fridge to look for something to eat. While he finished the sandwich he made for himself - still not as good looking as that ones David makes. Not that he’s ever gonna tell him that - he looked at his computer.

The little light by the power button blinked at him, almost invitingly.

_Come check._

Frank finished the sandwich and got up to wash the dish, putting the ones on the drying rack away in it’s cupboards.

Looking again, the computer light blinked.

_Come check._

Already a little bit angry at himself, he turned to go take a shower. Maybe a constant stream of cold water on him is what he needed, to maybe steer his mind away from that feed, at once.

It didn’t. He walked out with a towel wrapped around his hips, deciding it was time he went to bed, when he looked at his right.

_Come check._

Muttering a curse, he walked to the table and pressed the damn button, starting the computer up - slowly, agonizingly slowly, he needs to get a new one - and opening the live feed.

_‘Window’._

His breath got stuck in his throat.

A flower pot. White roses. Brand new.

He sat on the chair and stared at it for maybe a minute, before picking up his phone.

“Hello?”

Her voice was mellow and slow. Or maybe it was just his imagination.

“Didn’t know famous journalists picked up their phones after midnight”, he said, staring at the computer screen, counting the blooms of the new pot she had placed for his camera.

Karen hummed in his ear, like she was smiling. He imagined her hair falling on her face, just like it was when he took that gun from under her chin and put his face close to hers, those five seconds when they breathed the same air.

“We do, depending on who’s calling. Plus, I called you first.”

He smiled, some sort of warm relief washing him as he heard her voice.

“I’m getting kinda sick of not having a way to contact you, to be honest.”

“You do, though.”

“Flowers on the window don’t count. They’re awfully unilateral. It only works if you check.”

“I did check.”

“Took you long enough.”

Boom boom, his heart inside him.

“Were you busy?”

“Not as much as you”, he said, elbow on the table, zooming in on the feed, maybe trying to catch movement inside her window, even if he knew damn well that all he could get, maybe, if the wind tilted the camera, was a little bit of her floor. “Heard you on the radio this morning. You and, uh…”

“Trish Walker.”

“Yeah. That was interesting.”

A moment of silence.

“Just because I said you saved my life again?”

“Shouldn’t do that, you know?”

“She asked. You wanted me to lie and say you took me hostage?”

“I remember that was kinda the plan?”

“Just for you to get away. I told Brett the truth later.”

He clicked his tongue. He should have known.

“Can’t help yourself, can you?”

Another hum, and a sound like water moving around.

“How are you, Frank?” she asked, voice lower than a second ago, a tad more serious. “You were so banged up when I last say you, and then that mess at Central Park. I’m assuming that was you?”

Why he smiled, he has no idea. But he did, letting his head fall to the side a bit, dropping his voice, too, rolling a paper napkin between his fingers.

“Yeah…”

“Did you win, at least?”

“You could say that. Saved Madani again.”

She scoffed.

“You do that a lot.”

Again, why is he smiling?

“One could argue I do that a lot for you, too.”

Why does he sound like that? 

( _You know why, Frank, stop playing dumb_ , a voice in his brain.)

“Yeah, well… I’m not a federal agent. What’d you do now, jump off a building to save her life?”

“No, Miss Page. That was just for you.”

Another four, five seconds of silence before she talks again, slow and with a lilt. There’s definitely a lilt and he moves the phone away from his mouth so she doesn’t hear how heavy he breathes.

“What do you mean? When did you jump off a building for me?”

“Flight of stairs. Same thing.”

“You jumped off a flight of stairs?”

“Dislocated my arm in the process.”

More water moving.

“Sorry about that.”

“Not your fault. Where are you?”

One. Two. Three.

“Tub.”

He had to screw his eyes shut and bite on the inside of his cheek, images of long legs and soapy skin entering his brain without his permission, and he was suddenly aware.

He was wrapped in a towel and she was having a bath while they talked on the phone, after midnight.

Jesus Christ.

“I worry about you, you know?”, she went on. “It’s hard for me, not having any news.”

He doesn’t have anything to say to that. If he explains that it’s for her own safety, he’s pretty sure she’s gonna hang up on him, and, honestly, right now, he would rather die.

“When can I see you?”

He heard the water moving, lolling, like she was moving her hand around, or something, and he tried tried tried to not think about her sitting there naked on her bathtub talking to him.

“You want to?”

He almost cried when she took a deep, deep breath, and let out a “Yeah” on her exhale.

“Ok”, he said after a rogue flash of wet arms around his neck and the phantom pressure of her fingers on his arm. “When?”

“Now?”

He didn’t say anything. Not because he thought he shouldn’t, but because he wanted to. Almost too much.

“Frank?” she called.

“Hmm?”

“Now.”

.:.

He knocked on her door without any idea of what he was going to say. If he was being honest, he didn’t even know how he managed to drive there without killing anyone on the way, so distracted he was by potential scenarios and the tone of her voice in his ear, that particular tone he had never heard before, but wanted to hear always, now.

She opened the door and it was all dark behind her.

Her hair was not wet, as he had imagined it would be. It was up in a loose bun on the top of her head, but she had missed a lock. That one stuck to her neck and waved in a thin line against her collarbone, the robe she was wearing hiding further skin from him.

“I hate it when you vanish”, she said as a greeting, small, tiny smile on her lips, stepping aside to let him in.

She smelled like lavender. Or something flowery and fresh.

“Sorry.”

“Stop doing it, then.”

While she closed the door, he looked at the window, where the flowers sat.

Walking in, Karen stopped in front of him and studied his face. He noticed the wine glass on her hand when she raised the free one to remove his hoodie, moving to inspect the gash Billy’s bullet had left on the side of his head.

“How are you?”

Why did she need to be wearing a robe? Why didn’t she turn any of the lights on? Why is she drinking wine and why did she sound like that on the phone?

“No one’s trying to kill me, so”, he deflected, but then he regretted it, looking for her eyes with his, assigning himself a new mission. Fuck it. He wanted to hear that voice again. “You?”

She raised her brows and let out a breath, shrugging lightly, her hand still on his face, dropping it once she saw the healing wound.

“Good enough.”

“What’s this, then?” he pointed to her wine glass.

They stood there in the dark, the light of one single lamp on the hallway to her bedroom and the glare from her open windows the only thing allowing him to see the soft curve of her mouth.

“This is me trying to ease out of a tough week.” He watched as the sip she took made its way down her throat. “You want to join me?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok. Problem is”, she said, taking another sip and handing him the glass, walking towards the kitchen when he took it. “I don’t have another fancy glass like that. Foggy broke the other one, so it’s either sharing this one with me or drinking your wine out of a coffee mug.”

Taking a brand new bottle from inside the fridge, she turned to him and waited for his answer.

He finished her glass and reached for the bottle, letting her lean on the counter while he opened it.

.:.

This was either a very, very bad idea or a really, really good one. He might even regret it later, once he doesn’t have so much wine dulling his senses, but, right now, he’s enjoying himself too much to stop.

She pulled his boots off him before they finished the first glass. They now sat under the couch, forgotten.

His black beanie was the next to go, when she pulled it off him and placed it over her own head, her hair now down under it, the strands turning in soft, loose curls.

While he gave her a brief and not at all detailed account of what had happened with Russo, she sat by his side and sipped her wine, body twisted towards him, the knot on her robe becoming increasingly weaker, revealing the poor excuse of pajamas she wore under it. Short shorts and a tank top that was slowly, slowly driving him crazy.

When the bottle he had opened was half empty, she got up to get snacks and, when she came back, he noticed she was favoring her left foot a little bit.

“What happened there?” he asked, pointing that fact out, and she brushed him off, told him how her heel had gotten stuck in broken concrete on a sidewalk three days ago, and it still hurt a bit.

He had been massaging that foot for half an hour, now, and she was lying down, her head propped up on a pillow, leg on his lap, the other one bent, the empty bottle on the coffee table in front of them, the last of the wine sitting on the glass they shared by its side.

She was not drunk, drunk. Not really. Not sober, either, so he had taken the glass away from her line of vision and reach, finishing the last third of the bottle by himself.

He wants no excuses. He wants to hear that voice again, that breathed “yeah” she let out for him on the phone, he wanted that.

“So how does Madani fit in this?”

Frank looked at her, lying there on her back, his beanie on her head, her foot in his hand, his thumbs pressing from her sole to the middle of her calf and back, massaging the muscles, rolling her ankle, gripping it tight and then doing it all over again.

This time, he reached the back of her knee.

“She had to settle some shit, too.”

“With you?”

Draining the last of the wine, he put the empty glass back down and decided that, as much as he liked this, the look on her face while she asked about the depth of his involvement with another woman, it was enough. For now, it was enough.

“No” he said, tugging on her foot, making her slide a tiny bit further towards him, and then reaching his hand for hers, finally letting go of that ankle. With an expression that betrayed both amusement and excitement, she reached her own hand, taking his, and he pulled her up. “Not with me”.

He felt like a teenager, with that nice buzz fuzzing his thinking a little, but not impairing it, just making everything more… Mellow and simple.

It was so simple, when she sat up, with her legs over his, and looked at his face. Nothing wrong with looking at her lips, or letting his eyes run around her neck and the skin exposed by the dislodged robe.

Nothing at all.

“And then she got in over her head”, she went on, leaning towards him a little further, eyes in his and then on her own inspection of his face. “And you had to swoop in and save the day.”

It was not like that at all, but what does it matter, right now?

“Something like that.”

Her face was so close to his, now, he could count the freckles spread across her cheeks and her nose.

“And, somehow, people keep calling you a terrorist”, she said, before moving to get up, bringing the empty bottle of wine with her, supporting her hand on his shoulder to help her, probably on her way to get a new one.

He let her get to her feet, but then reached his hand and found her wrist, pulling on it, making her turn on the spot and come back down.

This time, though, she was lodged on top of him, maneuvered by his hands and her own movements. Frank took the bottle from her and sat it back on the coffee table, leaning back on the couch after, his feet planted on the floor and his legs spread wide, to support her on top of him.

Enough wine for Miss Page tonight.

The look on her face was different, yet familiar to him. It was a look he had seen before, that evidenced how opened she was, little smiles and long stares, nips of her own bottom lip, plus something new and exciting and, now, fingers on his chin, tracing his jaw, her legs around his hips, his hands on her thighs.

“I really should be angry at you”, she said, so low, and all he did was look up at her and inch his hands further up her legs. “All this time without news. Months, again, and not a peep out of you.”

She’s right, of course. At first, he thought it best to lay low, not lead anyone that might be watching to her door, but then too much time passed, and the more time went by, the more difficult it became to approach her, that almost irresistible urge of knocking on her door immediately after the events in that hotel getting crowded by a million ‘what if’s.

“But you did save my life”, she concedes. “And you were so banged up I kept being worried instead of angry.”

His head is resting against the back of the couch and he is looking up at her, the tips of his fingers teasing the ends of her robe.

“I was around”, he admits, and the surprise that settles on her expression only makes her that much more alluring. Somehow. “Checking.”

“Checking?” she echoes, something that looks like annoyance settling.  _“Checking_?”

“To make sure you were safe.”

“And you couldn’t”, the word punctuated with a light blow to his chest, which he can’t help but laugh at. “Let me know you were ok? Not a ‘hi, Karen. I’m not dead, just so you know’?”

He shrugs and she makes the angry face that makes him want to kiss her.

In a minute.

“I almost did once.”

“And what stopped you?” she pushed against his chest, annoyed but a hint of a smile creeping around her lips.

“I think you were on a date.”

At that, she stopped moving, and he caught her wrists in his hands.

“When was this?”

“When was the last date you had?”

“I had more than one, I’ll have you know”, inching closer to his face, smiling, defiant, the back of her thighs sliding on his jeans, tips of her hair tipping towards his face, his beanie covering her forehead.

“Did you, now?”

“Yes.”

With his thumbs caressing the inside of her wrists, he let go of her to run his hands on her shoulders, down her back, settling on her waist.

“So which date are you talking about?”

He sighed, because she leaned into him and pulled on the zipper of his hoodie, her lips touching his temple lightly, and he closed his eyes, tilting his face.

“M’ not sure. After Christmas.”

“Hmm”. She teased the zipper a bit. “Nate.”

She was already on his lap. So he figured it would be ok if maybe he undid the knot keeping her robe closed.

“Nate?” he asked, pulling on the sash around her waist and she took a deep breath.

“Yeah.”

There it was. Like fuel, burning up that simmering thing inside him, making it go up in flames, making him tighten his hold on her and pull her closer to him, his mouth landing just below her ear, and she let out another breath.

“He was really nice”, went her voice there in his ear, just like when they were on the phone earlier, but now he had his hands full. Much better. “But, you know. I kept thinking during dinner, ‘Would he ever take any bullets for me?’”

The chuckle that left him could not be avoided.

“I can shoot him and we’d find out.”

Sitting back on his legs, she looked at his face again, hands still on that zipper.

“No need. Believe it or not, I’m actually against shooting people.”

“Could have fooled me.”

His face was tilted up. Hers was tilted down. Inches. Not many inches, at that. Reaching up, he pulled that beanie off her, making her smile widen, teeth showing, the whole works. Frank sucked in a breath when she lowered the zipper of his hoodie and inched her hips higher, and her eyes roamed his face, hands on his chest, but then her eyebrows shot up and she squinted, all very quick, less than a second.

“What’s this?” she asked, pulling the gun from where it was tucked on the waist of his jeans.

He felt the barrel sliding on his stomach, following her knuckles, and made use of the interruption to finish with that knot, opening her robe and pulling it off her other arm.

“That would be my gun.”

“Why do you still have it on you?”

Watching as she took her arm from the robe he pulled off her, he dropped his eyes to her legs, bare and smooth against his jeans, begging for his hands.

“Force of habit, I guess.”

Getting up on her knees, she moved forward to place the gun on whatever surface there was behind her couch, which put his face on her cleavage.

Frank opened his mouth on the skin not covered by her tank top, licking a path up her neck, and that free hand went to his shoulder while she sat back, slowly, looking at his face again.

“Any other weapons I should know about?”

“No, ma’am. Are you gonna kiss me or what?”

“I was waiting for you to do that.”

Hand balled up on the back of her head, her hair tangled between his fingers, Frank sat up and pulled her head down to his, opening his mouth on hers, tongue poking out, tasting her, shit, she was like a live wire, why the fuck did he take so long-

Her hands were soft in his hair for a second, arm bending between them to touch his face before she pulled on his hoodie, trying to remove it, other arm around his shoulders, holding herself to him while he leaned forward to remove the thing.

When it was gone, discarded somewhere along with her robe, he put an arm around her, the other reaching to his side to hold her leg around his hip, and got up from the couch, getting drunker on the wine he tasted on her tongue than on the bottle he drank earlier.

“Ow!” she exclaimed, laughing against his mouth when he walked them right into the column in the corner of her living room.

“Sorry”, he whispered, smiling with her lips against his, going right back to kissing her when she didn’t seem to mind, nibbling on his lower lip.

After maybe half a minute of pressing her there against that weird column, running his hands all over her, kissing her as hard as he wanted to since… Fuck, he doesn’t even know since when anymore, Karen untangled her legs from around him, sighing towards the ceiling when he dropped his mouth back to her neck, her hands raising his skin in shivers when she slid her fingers down his chest and slowly, softly, started undoing his belt.

He’s counting backwards from a hundred in his mind, because if he allows himself to get lost in this like he wants, this is really not gonna last that long, and he wants it to.

Frank has her earlobe between his teeth when she pulls the belt off him, arms coming up to scratch on his back after tossing it away, sighing so good to him before he finds her lips again, tongues rolling around and against each other so deliciously.

Both his hands are tangled in her hair again when she moves, making him take a step back and then turning around inside his arms, pulling him  through the dark towards, he assumed, her bedroom.

He turns her towards him again when he sees her bed, finding the hem of her tank top and pulling it up over her head.

Frank hears that voice again, those moaned out words she first let out when she had him on the phone, a few more times throughout the night. He only falls asleep when his skin is red and angry with the lines left behind by her blunt nails, a love bite or two tucked away in the corners of her - under her breast, right above her heart, on the inside of her right thigh, maybe another one on the left - and all her pillows are scattered on the floor.

And he wakes up before her, when the light from the window hits his face and makes his head spin, a nasty hangover saying hello to him. It had been a while since he last got drunk on wine.

Slowly, carefully, he moves from under her, not at all wanting to wake her up yet, and gets up to close the curtains, sighing in relief when the light is blocked.

When he came back to bed, his teeth were brushed, his face was washed, he had his underwear on, and there was a big glass of water and two Advils he had found on her cabinet above the sink for her when she woke up. She drank almost a whole bottle more than him, she was bound to wake up with a headache.

He hears the moan before she turns her head to him.

“Oh, shit”, she says and he caresses her hair. “My head.”

Karen sits up when he offers her the glass of water, drinking it slowly, her forehead creased, hair a mess, but to him, this might be the best she ever looked, naked and sleepy, without anything between them except for the covers of her bed.

He watches when she comes back from the bathroom and picks up the pajama he had taken off last night.

It’s cold outside, the winter not really gone yet, and she’s shivering when she kisses him, so he runs his hands on her legs, up her back, down her arms and up again, pulling her to his chest and she sighs, head tucked under his chin.

“I don’t wanna leave this bed today”, she says against his skin and he tightens his hold on her.

“That is a deal.”

When the delivery guy knocks with their lunch, Frank makes him wait a little bit, and Karen bites on a pillow to muffle the loud noises she had been letting out, but he takes that away so he can kiss her, hand tight on one of her butt cheeks, keeping her hips up for him, groaning his own high in her ear, not really caring when the guy knocks again, a little louder. 

Priorities. 


End file.
